Charles Bukowski’s gravestone epitaph ‘Don’t Try’

Many people have wondered what the gravestone epitaph of the great American counter-culture poet and novelist Charles Bukowski means – ‘Don’t Try.’ I was baffled by this too until I came across this ‘all things’ Bukowski.net web site.

Bukowski said:

Somebody asked me: “What do you do? How do you write, create?” You don’t, I told them. You don’t try. That’s very important: not to try, either for Cadillacs, creation or immortality. You wait, and if nothing happens, you wait some more. It’s like a bug high on the wall. You wait for it to come to you. When it gets close enough you reach out, slap out and kill it. Or if you like its looks, you make a pet out of it.
– Charles Bukowski

2 comments on “Charles Bukowski’s gravestone epitaph ‘Don’t Try’”

My immediate thought was that ‘ Don’t try’ was the beginning that ended with ‘just do’! Great thought on how to just get on with writing, or really anything else creative in life. Never heard of this writer before *blush*, but I will check him out now.

Hi Wendy. Great to get your comment. I was thinking more along the lines of existentialism such as ‘just be’ or ‘to be’ rather than try to do according to what labels society puts onto things and us. He was one of the more eccentric, but brazened counter-culture writers from the 1960’s onwards. He always gives me a good chuckle.